Scandinavia’s importance in African logistics

[divider style=”solid” top=”25″ bottom=”25″][dropcap]T[/dropcap]ransportation is a leading tool in pushing social and economic growth. It brings a lot of opportunities to several struggling economies such as those in some African countries, enabling their economies to be more competitive. The development of transportation links people to jobs, education, and the supply of goods and services, and also health services.

Transportation allows people to interact creating knowledge and solutions to problems that enable the growth of society in general.

Thus, this is a sector that needs to be taken into consideration. Over the years, Norway’s ties with African countries continue to increase trade between Norwegians and Africans deepens. Since 2018, Norway’s activities in Africa have increased to about 50% and of late, a permanent mission was set up by the country with the AU (African Union).

An established logistics company in Africa known as Freight in Time which has many branches in several African countries and in other countries around the world has partnered with Norfund to provide services for poor African communities. FiT is a Kenyan logistics company, created in 1969, and offers fast Air, Sea, Road freight and also has contracts with some brokerages to provide logistics services.

It is reported that Norfund, which is a Norwegian institution in charge of the funding of foreign investments for Norway invested over a billion shillings to promote the growth of East African countries.

The government of Norway, through its investment fund, Norfund, bought shares in FiT because they are interested in the region and are making this move in order to visualize and understand the development. Thus they made a long-term partnership with the company in order to carry out their goals of developing the sector and contributing to the country’s growth with non-financial and professional support.

The company also stated that the reason why they partnered with Norfund is that the institution has more humanitarian goals. And this was also Norway’s goal to expand its freight industry to African countries. In recent years, Norwegian businesses are slowly becoming more influential in the African markets. Norway has always been at the forefront of humanitarian operations in Africa and a lot of Norwegian companies see Africa as a potential hub for their foreign investments.

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Norfund activities in Kenya: long-term business activities and a center for transit

According to an author from Norway, they have always wanted to contribute to the development of long term enterprises and the growth of the economy in general. The MD for Freight in Time announced that the funds will be used to improve certain transportation services in the region such as increasing the spending on courier services across the country. He also stated their plans to set up a warehouse close to the Jomo Kenyatta Nairobi International Airport.

They considered this location great for transit, which will also make the courier services of the company even faster. The organization together with their Norfund partners plan to set up FiT shops in certain regions and also in Nairobi, because these locations are supposed to serve as pick up points for the purchase of vans, fleets of delivery motorcycles, and will also serve as drop points.

Kenya has often been considered as a transit hub in Africa after Ethiopia. And according to numerous advice and even advice FiT should focus the investment of Norfund into third party distribution, temperature controlled-warehouses, especially in underserved countries in East Africa.

A valuable partnership with Gavi

This is an institution that has dedicated its operations to serve the populations in areas of Africa that are poverty-stricken and cannot provide basic health care. It is a private partnership and provides vaccinations for children in these poor countries. Gavi has not only invested its efforts in vaccinations but is using its platform to advance the distribution and logistics partners and have developed some partnerships around the world.

FiT besides being a logistics company often engages in humanitarian activities, which is why it partnered with Norfund, and it also partnered with Gavi to deliver some of its supplies to Uganda, mostly in underserved areas and poor rural regions.

When such an investment is made, there is a lot of expectation from the local community. Several communities are expected to benefit from this scheme through job creation, especially in remote areas.

This investment by Norfund will also go a long way in generating tax revenues while providing the country with very effective freight services and solutions, especially to the agricultural and humanitarian sectors. Also, there will be a promotion of the standards of corporate governance in the country.

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